


Afterimage

by dinodo



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen, I know jack shit about dnd and about exandria lmao, Its not super heavy or detailed or anything but like vecna was a bad time, Post-Campaign 1, Post-Episode 115, Recovery from trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-23
Updated: 2018-10-23
Packaged: 2019-08-06 13:18:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16388447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dinodo/pseuds/dinodo
Summary: Vex’s eyes can’t pierce illusions, and her magical talents are small and shoddy in the face of those like Keyleth and Scanlan, but that doesn’t change the fact that sometimes, she sees things she shouldn’t.  Things that nobody else does. But then, none of them has died as many times as she has.Or, Vex'ahlia and her ghosts.





	Afterimage

There must be something, Vex thinks, about dying. Something that untethers your soul just slightly more each time you do it, something that makes you harder to retrieve each time you drift beyond the gate. Vex’s eyes can’t pierce illusions, and her magical talents are small and shoddy in the face of those like Keyleth and Scanlan, but that doesn’t change the fact that sometimes, she sees things she shouldn’t.  Things that nobody else does. But then, none of them has died as many times as she has.

She notices it first in the year after Vecna--the fact that Whitestone Castle is a house of ghosts. It’s not just because of the brutal murders of the most recent rightful owners--it's something that she thinks must occur to any venue this large and lived in and old. The former inhabitants visit their old home more frequently than Vex had ever assumed was possible. She doesn't see them all the time, of course, and they aren't the wailing, shrieking spirits of the undead--in fact, Vex is almost certain that they are fully, one-hundred percent deceased and not on this plane despite interacting with it in the slight ways they do.

Rather than haunting, the ghosts hover, as though the castle is some sort of tourist locale. They drift across the floors, peering at the décor and the furniture. Some of them appear to even interact with one another, as though discussing how in their day the gallery was furnished far better, and who hired the person that placed that chandelier in the foyer because honestly, it’s gaudy, you’d think the de Rolos would know better. The residents, though, they treat with care.  More than once Vex sees the shimmer of a near-invisible hand clasp over Cassandra's to still its shaking as she attempts to draft yet another letter for yet another duty that should never have been hers. More than once she has seen the flash of a proud, amused smile as Percy talks circles around tentative allies and potential enemies with a poise Vex knows comes from participating in and observing years of terse, life-or death negotiations. She is proud of him, for taking this on, proud of both him and Cassandra. She sees their family watching and knows they feel the same.

Nevertheless, she sometimes avoids the castle. Her house, in contrast, is new and nearly entirely untouched by death; and sometimes the flashes she sees across the planes are too much. She doesn’t want to always live with the dead. She tells Percy what she sees, sometimes, but she doesn't share the details. It seems private, in a way. A secret, between her and the dead.

 

* * *

 

Keyleth is still the summer breeze, and Pike the sun, and Scanlan as fondly irritating and Grog as unrestrained and brash as ever. There is a weight to all of them now, though, that creeps to the forefront of the group. They see each other in short but increasingly frequent spurts, in the brief moments that Keyleth can transport via plants to Whitestone for a few hours between meetings, or that Scanlan can pop over using the Gatestone until someone of arcane means finds his singing through the entirety of their political meetings disruptive and sends him back. Their homes are miles apart, but with what they’ve been through Vex finds that they're closer than ever. Perhaps they have all finally grasped the insignificance of the time they have here--the fragility of their lives.

Vex doesn't see the ghosts that linger in Vox Machina’s thoughts often in real life—the people she knows seem to try to stay away or out of sight, for the most part. She goes back to their old keep numerous times, but the spirits of their fallen guards don’t seem to linger. Tiberius’s red scales have never slipped past the corner of her vision either. She wonders if its intentional, if they know to avoid her because it might dig into old wounds, or if it's something on her end, her unwillingness to dwell on their deaths for any longer than she must.

She does see Willhand Trickfoot once, when his death is still fresh and they are all with Pike in Wesruun, going through the things that were his. The vision is unexpected, but as they clear out his house for Pike to take over ownership, she catches the old man standing in front of his granddaughter, an insubstantial hand softly cupping her tear-stained face. Pike can’t see him, Vex knows, but her shoulders seem to relax just slightly and her face softens, some of the weariness and grief ebbing away. Willhand’s eyes flick directly to Vex with a startling awareness of her observation that she's never seen in a spirit before. He looks peaceful, but imploring, and Vex nods almost imperceptibly as a fierce conviction wells within her. Pike’s only real blood relative may be gone, but she is not without family—they will make sure she knows it.

 

* * *

 

The first and only time she sees Vax in full form, the wound from his absence is still aching and raw. She is in Syngorn, her first time back since fighting Vecna, her first time trying to go about  this whole ambassador job with what feels like a gaping hole in the centre of her being. Seeing Syldor tears at the edges of it, not because he’s cruel—they came to an understanding, in that year before everything went to hell, and while he is not loving he is respectful, at least—but because she should not be here, in her father’s house, debriefing him on their defeat of a demi-god, alone. In all her times coming here as an ambassador, her brother has been in the back of her head—sharing her experiences with him was always the first order of business after a particularly taxing trip, sprinting from her house to drag him to the nearest tavern the second he stepped from the Sun Tree, leaving Keyleth and Percy in the dust. This time, every idiotic thing city officials and council members spew, every unintentional narrow-minded slip her father makes, every hilariously sarcastic or heart-meltingly sweet thing Velora says to her triggers an automatic _I can’t wait to tell Vax—_ , until the painful void in her heart swallows the sentence and swells larger. Sometimes she wonders if it will consume her altogether.

She and Velora are walking the streets of Syngorn, Velora shouting with the exuberance of any pre-teen girl let out of school for a full day, the aftereffects of her death and resurrection invisible for the time being. Syngorn’s ghosts don’t bother Vex in the slightest—she knows none of them, and if she were to, holds only as much sympathy for them as they would for her, which is likely very little. She ignores them as they slip past her silently, ignores the stares she gets still from both the living and the dead full elves wandering the street. A title and station can only do so much for one’s reputation when it is a thing you are born with, and it seems death does very little to abate one’s prejudices, at least for those as long-lived and fixed in their ways as pure-blooded elves.

As they cross a bridge at the edge of town, Velora hops up to the edge and, before Vex can stop her, scrambles to stand on the very top of the railing and begins tightrope-walking across it. It’s a long way down to the river and the rocks below, and Vex is about to yell for her when she sees Velora lose her balance just slightly and begin to tilt towards the edge. A wave of cold panic washes over Vex as she kicks herself into motion, sprinting towards her sister, but she’s too slow and she feels herself in that moment once again, the world ending, herself falling to the ground, frozen and helpless, watching Vax spiral uncontrollably from the sky on clipped wings.

There’s what feels like an unnatural gust of wind and through the fog of memory Vex sees a blur of black hurtle into—through—Velora, stopping her tilt towards the river below and toppling her backwards onto the bridge. She lands with a solid thud and sits stunned for a moment, then bursts out laughing. Vex finishes her mad dash and collapses next to her on the bridge, hugging Velora as though she might disappear if let go. Velora keeps laughing until Vex’s tears begin soaking into her shirt, at which point she pushes Vex up and her face contorts into an expression of worry.

“It’s ok, Vex. Nothing bad happened, see? I’m right here!”

Vex takes a deep breath and tries to collect herself, but ends up dissolving into deep, shuddering  sobs. Velora’s arms wrap around her, small and wiry but strong. She doesn’t know how long they sit there for, on that bridge, mourning their loss and holding onto each other for dear life, but it feels good to let go of her composure for once, to pour her sorrow out into the world. At some point, Vex feels another set of arms join Velora’s, larger and stronger and shaking just slightly. She doesn’t look up, not until her tears have finally stopped, not until he’s let go and is fading once again into the distance. Velora doesn’t notice, of course, but Vex watches her brother—more substantial than any other spirit she’s ever seen, so vivid that she wonders exactly what he is, what it is that his Queen has him influencing on their plane—as he walks away from them again. His shoulders are strong, but she can see the slightest tremble to them, and there are three feathers braided into his long hair—one blue, one black, and one brown. She doesn’t call out to him, but she can tell he knows she’s watching.

Afterwards, she knows he’s there, sometimes. He’s different from the rest of the ghosts, but then, he is a part of her. When she feels her vision involuntarily drawn to nearby pitfalls and avoids them so her steps are as silent as the grave, when her thieves tools slide in and out of a lock type she’s never come across before with the precision of a master, when an unnatural breeze like a wing beat passes her face as she sails across the sky on her broom, she can feel him. Somehow, he never brings the same discomfort the other ghosts do. Her knowledge of his presence isn’t supernatural in the same way—it just is.

 

* * *

 

The temple of the Raven Queen is an odd place to go for solace, but in her case Vex thinks it’s understandable. She’s not entirely sure what the gods think of their followers paying homage to other gods. It’s probably a bad idea, but she’s not entirely sure she cares. Vex is a devoted servant and champion to Pelor, but the Raven Queen's touch has been on her from the time of her first death. Vax's sacrifice, Kashaw’s and Pike’s magic, brought her back, but no one escapes death unscathed, and if there’s someone who’s to blame for Vex’s walking in two worlds it is the Matron of Ravens herself.

Vex is one of few who ever goes to the temple in Whitestone, although the number of those who follow the goddess of death seems to be slowly increasing. It’s probably Vax’s fault, she thinks. Everything usually is. Empty or not, the shades here are more respectful than anywhere else, in that they at least keep out of her sight. Vex is sure they’re around, curiously observing the passage of time in the living world, wondering at the strangeness of Whitestone’s Lady lurking in an almost-abandoned crypt of a temple, but they don’t edge into her vision as much as they do elsewhere. The Queen’s sway here must dissuade them from poking their noses disrespectfully into other people’s business.

The altar is smooth and cold, and the blood Percy stole from the temple in Vasselheim sits still and clear in its place. Some days, Vex goes over to it and stares in, unsure what she’s hoping for a glimpse of. Others, she simply walks in and raps her knuckles irreverently on the altar’s stone surface.

“You’d better be looking after him,” Vex says into the emptiness, “If I get over there and he’s in any way damaged, you’ll have me to deal with. I’ve faced down an ascended god before. I’m willing to do it again”

Threatening a goddess in her own temple is also probably a bad idea, but Vex thinks they have an understanding. The loud “CAW!” and swirling of feathers from outside the door to the crypt sound more to her like acquiescence than anger.

 

* * *

 

Some days, bad days, when she’s tired and hurting and her mind is tied up and held captive to the memories of Vecna and dragons and gods and the people she’s lost, even her house in Whitestone is too much. Her worst mornings always seem to push her vision farther away from this plane, and even faintest shades of the former inhabitants of this plot of land that drift past outside become more vivid and more immediate. On these days, Vex feels like she cannot escape death, not in her mind, not in her life, not for a minute. These are the mornings that she clings to Percy the hardest as she kisses him goodbye, and each time he holds her eyes with a look that pierces the haze of heavy, pressing fear and grief.

“I’ll be here when you return, dear.” He always says, holding her gently, tracing a hand through her hair, his artisan’s fingers brushing over the feathers behind her ear. She nods her head against his chest and pushes down the lump in her throat, feeling the tears well again. Gods, how she loves him.

“Just return,” He whispers into her hair, “that’s all I ask.”

Vex takes her broom and a pack and flies, to the heavens where her ghosts and those of others don’t tread, to the skies that are clear of spirits, clear of dragons and demi-gods and anything else that would threaten. Sometimes she’s gone for days, or weeks. Sometimes she finds herself all the way to Keyleth, sits with her far from the wisps of Zephrah’s dead, on the edge of a cliff, looking out across the skies and land and seas that remain intact only because of them and what they’ve lost. They lean against each other until any tears have dried across both their cheeks, until Vex’s heart has stilled, until she can see her way past the ghosts and the shades of death that pull her down and away from the world. Until she can see her way to life, to a future.

Sometimes, she feels the slightest, softest warmth of a familiar hand on her shoulder, and the barely-there brush of a feather across her cheek. She smiles.

She always returns.  



End file.
